Shadow on the Mountain

by Margi Preus

  “A million and one!” Espen said, and he skied on.

  This might be the luckiest part of the whole trip, he thought. There was a girl from school who was on holiday with her parents at their family cabin near Riksdal. Maybe she would see him skiing alone—valiantly—across the mountain meadow and wonder: What was his errand that he looked so intent on his purpose? It must be something of grave importance that inspired him to move along with such strong and confident strides. Perhaps she would realize, just by his bearing, that he was—

  His daydream was cut short when one of his ski poles accidentally planted itself between his skis, tripping him, and he fell face-first into the snow.

  I hope she wasn’t watching just then, he thought. He got up, wiped off his glasses, dug the snow out from under his collar, and brushed off his trousers. Just a few more kilometers to the Riksdal church.

  he sounds of voices and the noise of clattering dishes drifted up from downstairs, and Ingrid knew she should hurry. But there was something she wanted to write about. A secret she couldn’t tell anyone. Not anyone at all, except her diary.

  I’ve done something, she wrote, and I don’t know if it’s good or bad, right or wrong.

  “Ingrid?” her mother called. “You do remember that there’s school today?”

  I was waiting for Auntie Berit to finish work at the office where they handle the ration cards. When Auntie left the office, I sat for a while, staring at the boxes of cards sitting there, open.

  First I thought: These boxes shouldn’t be open like that, where anybody could steal them. I planned to mention it to Auntie when she returned.

  But then I got started thinking about what I might do if I had some extra ration cards myself. I know it sounds bad! I know what you’re thinking, Diary—if diaries can think, which I suppose they can’t—so I suppose it’s me who’s thinking this. You are (or I am) thinking that this seems very wrong indeed. And as well as wrong, it seems bad.

  But what if—

  “You’ll be late!” her mother shouted.

  That is, I know it’s wrong. But, on the other hand, maybe it is not so terribly wrong. I have stolen some ration cards! Ingrid scrawled, then slammed her diary shut and crammed it under her pillow. She jumped up and rummaged in her sock drawer for a few moments and pulled out a pair of stockings. Red. That would be a good color. The Germans hated it when you wore red. Red was a Communist color. That was what they said. But it was also one of the important colors of the Norwegian flag—a patriotic color.

  “Ingrid,” Espen hollered, “we’re going to be late!”

  Ingrid reached into the drawer again and felt around until her hand found a small bundle of cardboard cards. She stood still for a moment, looking at them. She couldn’t just run downstairs with a fistful of ration cards! What would Mor say? Or Espen? They would want to know where she’d gotten them.

  So Ingrid lifted her skirt, slid some of the cards into her underwear, and ran downstairs with her stockings in her hand. She sat down—carefully—on the bottom step to put them on.

  Espen stood by the door, staring through the window at the street. “Can’t you at least hurry up a little?”

  What was he looking at? Ingrid wondered, and she craned her neck so she could see out the window. She could just make out a red hat bobbing above the fence. She looked at Espen. His eyes followed the hat.

  Ingrid smiled as she tugged on her stockings. So, she thought, there was a girlfriend.

  Her mother handed her a cheese sandwich wrapped in wax paper, and Espen tossed her a pair of snow pants.

  “There’s a ski contest today, remember?” he said.

  She put on her snow pants and her jacket, and she and Espen headed out the door. But by the time they got out to the street, the red hat was just a tiny dot disappearing around a corner. Ingrid glanced at Espen and saw his face fall. Without a word, he collected their skis and poles and hoisted them onto his shoulder.

  Ingrid was silent all the way to school, determined to find the girl in the red hat. But when she got to the school yard, it was a sea of red hats. Ingrid’s friends Gretta, Astrid, and Solveig all had them on. Everyone was wearing one!

  hat will it be next?” Aksel said. He folded his newspaper to the column and read aloud: “‘Of course, one would be tempted to laugh if it weren’t so tragic that the Norwegians are carrying on with this foolishness while the whole world is in upheaval.’”

  “What kind of foolishness is that?” his mother asked.

  “It’s this nisselue business—these red stocking hats that everyone’s wearing. It’s so childish! It is just as Minister Lunde said right here in the paper, that the people who do these sorts of things make it seem as if we’re living in an insane asylum! Wearing a paper clip on their clothing—what is that supposed to mean?”

  “We bind together?”

  “And matchsticks in their hatbands?”

  “We’re enlightened?” his mother said. Then she added quickly, “I would assume.”

  Aksel thought he saw a slight smile cross her lips. “Oh, and then there’s the watch worn on the underside of the wrist. I forget what that’s supposed to mean.” He glanced at her. Her lips were pressed tightly together.

  “I hope that you’re not involved in harassing people for such minor offenses, Aksel,” she said, “as I’ve heard those storm troopers—those Norwegian Nazis—have been doing all over the country.”

  “The hird?” Aksel snapped. “Where did you hear that?”

  “Oh …,” she replied, “one hears things … You know.”

  “It’s important to keep discipline, Mor,” Aksel said. “People must not be allowed to laugh at their government.”

  “Really?” she said.

  “The Norwegians must understand that the New Order is not to be made fun of! Norway has suffered from loose liberalism and permissiveness for too long. The Nazi party will reinstate order and authority. We have serious work to do, and we need the population to pull with us, not make fun of us!”

  “Yes, I see,” she said. “But Norwegians love their country just like anybody else, and you can’t really blame them when they dislike another country for coming in and taking over. It’s quite natural, really.”

  “Natural or not, it is also stupid what they do,” Aksel said, “resisting in these childish ways.”

  One of her eyebrows went up.

  “Don’t look at me like that!” he said. “It is childish!”

  “Perhaps so.” His mother set one boiled egg on his plate and one on her own. “But it is also effective.”

  Aksel squawked in protest. “I can’t believe I just heard you say that! After all I’ve done for you—I signed up for you, you know—so you could have coffee and beef and butter and eggs, and even chocolate sometimes. I did it for you!”

  She stared at her boiled egg as if it might crack open on its own. “For me?” she said. “Nice things and luxuries are not always the most important things, Aksel.”

  Aksel exhaled sharply and slammed the newspaper onto the table. “Even you!” he yelped, standing up abruptly. “Even you! Everyone is against me!”

  He immediately felt guilty about his outburst. He shouldn’t have spoken so severely. He knew that his mother suffered. Every day she grieved for his father, who had fought and died in the Winter War in Finland. How could the Norwegians forget that? His father, along with many other patriotic Norwegians, had gone to help the Finns fight against the Russians. Against Bolshevism! The same Bolsheviks the Germans were fighting against. How could the Norwegians not understand that?

  But now, because of Aksel’s decision, his mother’s old friends avoided her. Most of their relatives did, too. The butcher sold her the worst cuts of beef; the baker gave her burnt bread. Some shopkeepers would ignore her so utterly that she couldn’t even get served. But he could get food, and he brought her lots of things.

  Like coffee, he thought. Even if she has no friends anymore, she has coffee. Because of him.

/>   Still, he shouldn’t scold his mother like that. “I’m sorry, Mor,” he said. “I know you’ve made a lot of sacrifices for me. But I’m trying to make you proud. Today I am in charge of a ski contest. A meet at the school.” He got up from the table, gave his mother a kiss, and went out, pausing by the hall mirror to adjust his tie.

  He looked rather fine in his new uniform, he thought. Trim and fit and … well, handsome. He’d risen quickly in the ranks. He was quite sure there were any number of girls who were interested in him. He’d seen them glancing his way as he passed by on the street. He shouldn’t wonder but that he could have his pick of them. It’s just that he’d been too busy to have a girlfriend.

  And why did the girl he liked have to wear a blasted red hat?

  t was snowing when Ingrid and Espen lined up with the other students for the race. A fine day for a ski contest, even if it was a Nazi one, Ingrid thought.

  The race was compulsory, of course.

  “That’s the way it is with Nazis,” Kari said as they waited for the starting gun. “They want you to do something, so they make it compulsory.”

  “Compulsory uniforms,” said Rosa.

  “Compulsory propaganda hours for the NS,” Arne said.

  “A compulsory order to hang a portrait of Quisling in every classroom,” Rolf added.

  Ingrid joined in. “Compulsory visits to Hitler Youth exhibits!”

  When the gun went off, they skied the first part of the course without hurrying. In a leisurely fashion, Ingrid decided she would write in her diary.

  That was a good thing, because it was hard enough to ski with a bunch of cardboard stuffed into your underwear, much less to ski fast!

  The skiers continued across a long field outside the school together, talking and laughing, and then a message started being passed from one to another. By the time they had all reached the top of the hill overlooking the school grounds, everyone had heard the plan, and they all stopped, formed a long line, and turned back toward the teachers and Nazi officials waiting by the school. Then they began to sing the national anthem.

  “Ja, vi elsker dette landet,” they sang—“Yes, we love this country”—all the way through to the end. They finished by shouting, “Long live the king!” and then they all turned and skied into the nearby forest.

  It was a little bit crazy, Ingrid thought, but it sure felt grand! Once inside the shelter of the trees, the skiers slowed, stopped, and stood around laughing and chattering. Some decided to strike off for home or to town; others decided to go for a pleasure ski. No one intended to cross the finish line. Nor go back to school.

  The skiers began to disperse and disappear into the fast-falling snow, laughing and calling out to one another, “Wait for me!”

  Ingrid caught a glimpse of her brother, who was with a group of his friends, too. But he was looking at another, different group—a group of girls. Which one of them was he watching? Ingrid couldn’t tell. She tried to move around to get a better view, but several skiers crossed her line of vision, and then her friends pulled on her arm.

  “We’re going downtown,” they said. “Come with us!”

  “I would,” Ingrid said, “but I have something else I have to do.”

  Before she set off on her errand, Ingrid took one last glance at the group of girls and then at Espen, who was just then looking down, cleaning the snow off his glasses. But he’d clearly been gazing at one of them. Which one?

  spen listened distractedly to his friends while he kept one eye on Solveig, who was chatting with her friends.

  Per skied up to Espen. “Did you get the message?” he asked.

  Espen nodded.

  “So, you’re ready to go?”

  “Uh-huh,” he said. He could see Solveig over Per’s shoulder. “Where am I supposed to go?”

  “Stein says you should take this to Oleanna.” Per handed Espen a rucksack.

  Solveig had turned, and Espen could see her face now.

  “SOE sent us a radio operator,” Per said. “From England. We call him—”

  Solveig looked up and caught Espen’s gaze. Her cheeks were flushed and her eyes were bright from the cold. A shimmering scarf of snow draped her shoulders.

  “—Snekker.”

  “What? When did that happen? Where was I?” Espen asked.

  “Staring at pretty girls?” Per laughed.

  Espen laughed and glanced at Per, who said, “Are you going to go or not?”

  “Ja.” Espen slipped the rucksack over his shoulders.

  “You have to go right away,” Per urged. “Make sure nobody is following you. The Germans know there are radio transmissions coming from somewhere around there. So far they haven’t found out where. Let’s keep it that way.”

  “I’ll be careful,” Espen said.

  Per skied off with the other boys, but Espen stayed behind, watching Solveig laughing with her friends, most of whom were now plunging down the hill toward town. She turned around and looked right at Espen, and then suddenly, somehow, the two of them were alone, surrounded by a curtain of falling snow.

  Caught up in a sudden gust of air, the snow swirled and danced in sparkling ribbons around them. The other skiers had departed, their voices fading away; the whole world was blotted out, and there were only the two of them and this moment, a moment that might have lasted a minute, two minutes, hours, days, their whole lives, forever.

  How long had he been standing there gazing at her, he wondered, as the snow drifted down, stopped, shifted, swirled, lifted, fell. And collected on his glasses.

  I should say something, he thought. But no words came to him.

  “Solveig!” her friends called from the bottom of the hill. “Are you coming?”

  “We’re going downtown,” Solveig said. “Would you like to come along with us?”

  Yes! he wanted to say. Yes! I would! But he felt the weight of the rucksack on his back—what was in that thing?—and he felt himself shaking his head, no.

  Solveig turned, smiled back at Espen—and then she was gone.

  Espen turned away and set off in the opposite direction.

  The sense of falling snow stayed with him long after it had stopped, and for a while he skied along in a dreamy state. But then the air turned damp, and he suddenly felt chilled. He stopped to turn his collar up and realized how quiet it was, away from the rumble of army trucks, the stamping of boots on the pavement, the incessant “Heil Hitler” that was heard everywhere. It was so peaceful that all he heard was the sound of his own breathing, the soft thump of snow collapsing off a branch, the drumming of a far-off woodpecker. And a loud snap. What was that?

  He stood absolutely still for a long moment. It was almost as if he could hear someone breathing. Or was he imagining things? It must be his own breathing he heard, he decided, and he continued on his way.

  As he skied, his thoughts returned to the race and how everyone—all the students in the school—had sung the national anthem and shouted, “Long live the king!” There were too many of them to punish—because they had all participated. Like their teachers, who had won their battle against Quisling and the NS. Even after five hundred of those who were arrested were sent to a concentration camp, the remaining teachers still refused to sign on. Quisling had to give up and let the teachers go back to their—

  Suddenly, his scalp prickled, and he stopped thinking about anything and just listened. Because now there really was someone. Right there, behind him.

  urn around slowly,” a voice said, in British-accented Norwegian. Someone from England. Per had told him a name. What was it? Why hadn’t he paid attention?

  He turned slowly. The first thing he noticed was the pistol aimed at his head. Behind the gun was a young man.

  “Snekker!” Espen managed to sputter out. It made him laugh, a little nervously.

  “What’s so funny?” asked the man holding the gun.

  “Well, it’s kind of a funny name,” Espen said.

  “What’s so funny abou
t it?” The man dropped the hand with the gun, squinted, and let go a long fart. This made them both laugh.

  “I just figured out your name,” Espen said. “Snekker means ‘joiner,’ like a carpenter. You’re the radio operator who ‘joins’ us with our contacts in England. I’m Odin.”

  “Brilliant boy,” Snekker said. “Well, Odin, what did you bring me? I hope no more of that bread. What do they put in it, anyway?”

  “They can’t get decent flour anymore, so they lace it with chalk. Or sawdust. Nobody really knows. Everybody calls it fise brød,” Espen said. “Fart bread.”

  “That’s for sure,” Snekker said. “That last loaf made me quite musical.”

  Espen opened the pack and pulled out two tins of sardines, a chunk of brown cheese, a pack of bouillon, a rutabaga, some potatoes, and a bunch of turnips. And a couple of dubious-looking loaves of bread.

  “Is this really supposed to be edible?” Snekker turned the bread over in his hands, eyeing it skeptically.

  “You could try waiting a week until it dries out. That’s what a lot of people do,” Espen told him. “By the way, do you know why the baker was arrested?”

  “No. Why?” Snekker asked.

  “Because he added flour to his bread dough.”

  “Good one,” Snekker said. He glanced at his watch. “Well, it’s just about time to wake up my sweetheart.”

  “Your sweetheart?” Espen asked.

  “Everyone should have a sweetheart,” Snekker said. “Haven’t you got one back in town?”

  “For all I know, she already has a boyfriend,” Espen fretted.

  “Maybe a German soldier,” Snekker teased.

  “No!” Espen said. “Anything but that.”

  “You never know, though,” Snekker said. “I hear that a lot of girls like to go with the Germans. They give them silk stockings and chocolates and extra ration cards—romantic stuff, you know.”

  “Not Solveig!” Espen said. “She wears a nisselue.”

  “Ah, the red hat,” Snekker said.

  “Sometimes she pulls her collar through her buttonhole,” Espen offered.